1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to a porous calcium phosphate article for use as a medical implant, and in particular to a method of making a porous calcium phosphate scaffold for use as tissue-engineered scaffold.
2. Description of the Related Art
A tissue-engineered scaffold (majority made from biodegradable polymers) has a very porous structure that allows living cells (usually taken from the patient being treated) to penetrate into the structure and be “seeded” in-vitro during a cell culture process. After a period of time (days or weeks) of cell culture, the cell-seeded scaffold is implanted into either an animal (e.g., rat) whose immune system has been removed, or into the patient himself (usually under the skin for easier later-on process). During this period of time (weeks to months) the cells quickly multiply from absorbing nutrients from the animal or the patient's body, and, at the same time, the scaffold itself is gradually dissolved or resorbed. When this process is substantially “mature”, the implant (now a real bone) is removed from under the skin of the animal or the patient and re-implanted into the (wounded or diseased) site being treated. The following are some references describing some details about the background, requirements, applications, etc. of tissue-engineered scaffold: U.S. Pat. No. 6,139,578; U.S. Pat. No. 6,200,606; U.S. Pat. No. 5,306,303; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,132,463.
It is advantageous if a tissue-engineered scaffold is bioresorbable, sufficiently porous and supportive at the same time. The conventional high temperature (usually >1000° C.)-sintered porous hydroxyapatite (HA) block material does not possess sufficient micro/nano-sized porosity and is hardly bioresorbable. On the other hand, the conventional biodegradable polymer for scaffold application exhibits a relatively low strength and too high a dissolution rate.